A LIFE AND DEATH SITUATION
A Short Story by Aaron Young
"Not
the smartest thing I've ever done," he thought. Jonathan Ceran looked around at his
predicament. His left leg was clearly broken as evidenced by the excruciating pain and the
fact that his tibia was sticking out the side of his calf. Blood poured from the wound
only to join the raging creek and find its way downstream to who-knows-where. There were
two options from this point: give up and die, or fight for his life. People can say what
they want about his decision making skills, but no one would ever doubt his will to live.
The
first order of business was to stop the bleeding. If he lost too much blood, nothing else
mattered. He gingerly took off his $12.99 Walmart backpack, careful not to move his
fractured leg. Near the bottom of the pack, beneath the granola bars, Gatorade, camera,
and about 4 pounds worth of twigs and pine needles, he found the survival kit. It wasn't
much, but it was all he had. "This is the part that's going to hurt," he said
aloud. Taking a few deep breaths to steady himself, he jammed the bone back into the hole
as best as he could. The walls of the canyon echoed with his scream of agony. If there was
anyone around, they surely would've heard his cry. But there was no one within earshot. As
a matter of fact, the closest living person was at that point, 2.36 miles away, listening
to Dwight Yoakam's "Heart That You Own" while driving an 86 Ford F-250 down
Forest Service Road 33 en route to the Cougar Divide Trailhead. Not that any of that
mattered to Ceran.
The
pain at that moment was the most intense sensation, good or bad, that he had ever felt in
his life. He turned his head to the side and vomited into the creek. The pale brown mixed
with the dark red blood that still dumped out of his leg and formed a strange brownish-red
color that almost perfectly matched the color of the young moss on the rocks of the creek.
As the pain began to subside from hellish torment to unbelievable agony, he threaded a
needle and began to sew the gash shut the best as he could. It wasn't easy. His hands
shivered uncontrollably from shock, or the cold of the canyon, or more likely a
combination of the two. He ran out of thread before he got all the way across the wound so
he scrounged through the pack for a tube of super glue that he used to fix the frequently
broken tripods he bought. He emptied the entire contents into the wound and held the skin
closed for what seemed like eternity to allow the glue to work its magic. The patch job
wasn't pretty but it would have to do. He slowly began to wrap an ACE bandage around the
shattered leg. When the wrap was gone, he removed the long sleeved t-shirt that he always
kept in the backpack: "bright yellow so he could easily be seen by anyone wandering
the woods with a gun and a few beers in them". At least that was the joke he always
told anyone who asked about it. How he would love to have someone around to ask him that
now.
It
was by no means perfect, but he was fairly convinced, well maybe 10% convinced anyway,
that the wrap would stop the bleeding. He dry swallowed eight Advil and laid his head
against a rock while the pain rocked his body. In forty-seven seconds, Jonathan Ceran was
asleep.
Jonathan
slowly made his way out of sleep. He realized he was wet and his first thought was that he
had for some reason peed the bed. As his eyes opened it all came flooding back to him.
Sitting on a mossy rock, with the glacial-fed creek rushing passed, he had somehow fallen
asleep. How in the world could that happen?
He took another minute to work things out in his head, which didn't seem to be working
correctly. How long had he been asleep? A quick look at his watch told him: just over
three hours. He unwrapped the shirt from his leg. The bandage was saturated with blood but
the wound had stopped bleeding; at least for the time being. That was good. The concern
now was getting out of here. No one would be coming for him any time soon so it would be
his job to get out of this canyon by himself.
He
would need to splint his leg before any type of movement would be remotely possible. The
canyon had an abundance of wood jammed into any opening in the rocks. Cautiously moving
about on the rocks on which he sat, he was able to find two branches that were roughly the
correct length. The water of the creek had removed the bark, creating a smooth surface on
the branches, but they would work. He was sure of it.
Five
minutes later, Jonathan had used his long sleeved t-shirt, no longer yellow but an odd
maroon color, and the branches to construct a rugged but surprisingly efficient splint. He
found another branch that would have to serve as a crutch. It was by no means perfect but
these were desperate times. He took a quick look at his watch: 5:40 PM. He had about 3
hours of daylight left. If he was still in this canyon by dusk, he was dead.
There
was no way to climb back up the canyon wall in his current condition so he would have to
make his way downstream towards the mouth of the canyon. The first steps were taken
slowly, and very carefully, but he soon gained confidence in his makeshift crutch. It took
him nearly two hours to travel the 500' downstream to where he could climb out of the
creek bed and into the woods. He collapsed, leaning against the trunk of a massive cedar
tree, and rested.
As
darkness began to envelope the thousand year old forest around him, he began to search for
a place to spend the night. He found a small flat area and began to clear a small area for
a fire pit. By 8:30, as the first stars began to peak out from behind the clouds, he had a
fire blazing with enough wood to last for the night. As his clothes dried, he began to
gain confidence. The hardest part of his journey was over. He WOULD survive. He had to. He
laid his head against the soft earth and listened to the crackling of the fire, the
distant howl of the coyotes, and the chirps and croaks of the ancient forest as he slowly
fell asleep.
Sequoia
Ceran checked the clock for the tenth time in an hour.
It wasn’t uncommon for Jonathan to be a little late from one of his
little adventures but he’d never been this late.
Her brain was telling her there were a million reasons he could be late but
her heart knew the truth. Something was wrong. When the clock hit 1:30 in the morning she called
the police who informed her that there was nothing they could do until he’d been
missing 24 hours. She sat on the couch and
tried to maintain a positive attitude. He
would come home; he always came home. Just
before four, she fell asleep on the couch, waiting for Jonathan to come home. If he wasn’t there in the morning, she would
go out looking.
Jonathan
awoke with a start to the sound of a breaking branch.
He looked around the small clearing where he slept for the cause of the
noise but saw nothing. The early morning sun
burst through the forest in an alternating band of sun and shadow. If he was in a better situation he would have found
it breathtaking. The leg throbbed with an
unbelievable pain. As he slowing unwrapped the
wound, he could feel the heat coming off it. The
leg glowed a bright red. In addition to the
broken bone, a massive infection was now ravaging his left limb. He had to make it back to the car today! He checked the GPS:
two miles to the car as the crow flies.
In this terrain, on two healthy legs, that could take up to four hours. He slowly climbed to his feet and began the long
march towards the car.
After
getting the grand total of four hours of sleep, Sequoia woke up and immediately prepared
to go out looking. She knew the general area
where Jonathan had gone but wasn’t sure exactly what his destination was. She would look for his car and go from there but
she wouldn’t do it alone. The phone rang
four times before he answered.
“Hello,” came
the voice on the other end.
“Scott. It’s Sequoia.
I need your help.”
“What’s
wrong?” he asked.
“Jonathan
didn’t come home last night,” she answered.
“I’m going to go out to look for him. Will you go with me?”
“Of
course. Pick me up in 20 minutes. I’ll be ready.”
She
hung up the phone and prepared for a long day. Hopefully
they wouldn’t be too late.
Jonathan
Ceran’s progress through the woods was slow; very slow.
While the terrain was mostly flat, there were numerous obstacles that could
trip anyone up, even when healthy. Essentially
walking on one leg, he found himself spending as much time getting back up from falls as
he did actually moving forward.
He stopped for lunch some
time in the early afternoon and ate his last granola bar and a few handfuls of
not-quite-ripe blueberries. The battery on the
GPS had died earlier that morning but he estimated that he had traveled roughly half the
distance back to the road. Despite the
problems, he was fairly confident he would reach the road by dark. He was half way there in four hours with eight
hours of daylight left. No problem. The pain in his leg seemed to be lessening, though
he wasn’t sure if that was indeed the case or if he was just getting used to it. He pulled out the topographic map and took a look
at it. He probably had the map memorized by
now, but looking at the map gave him a few extra minutes of rest before the arduous
journey would continue. As long as he stayed
on his current course and didn’t change elevation he would be assured to hit the
road.
As he packed everything
back into its place in the pack he heard something fall but he could see nothing. All morning he had fought the feeling that someone
or something was following him. Just paranoia
he assured himself.
Sequoia and Scott began
their search on the eastern end of the
Honestly, Scott was
probably the worst person to join her in this search.
Several years ago, Jonathan found out about an affair Sequoia was having
with his then best friend. She finally
convinced him that the affair was over but the two had secretly been seeing each other the
whole time. Regardless of the history, she had
nowhere else to turn and Scott was a strong and highly intelligent man who refused to give
up on a project until it was complete. The
same traits that originally drew her to him were the same traits that would help Scott
find her husband. She would deal with the
repercussions later.
Eight hours, and nine dirt
roads into the search, Sequoia was beginning to give up hope. Only a few hours of daylight remained and they were
no closer to finding Jonathan. They had to
find him tonight.
Jonathan woke up confused. He had no idea how long he had been out and couldn’t
remember falling asleep. The sun was beginning
to set and he hadn’t made the road yet. He
got to his feet and began to continue on his previous route.
Why had he fallen asleep? How
far was he from the road? He traveled as fast
as he could; desperation overcoming any sense of safety he had. A sound on his right startled him and he snapped
his head in that direction looking for the source. The
hairs on the back of his neck stood up and then he saw it.
Something was watching him from behind a tree.
The fading light made it difficult to make out any features but there was
something there. He forgot about the pain and
started to run, as well as he could, in the direction of the road.
Scott and Sequoia had one
road left to drive. If they could not find
Jonathan’s car here, they would have to abandon the search. Dusk had settled firmly in as Scott dodged potholes
as he pushed the oversized pick-up along the forest service road as quickly as he dared. Sequoia cried quietly in the seat beside him.
“We’ll stay at
my house tonight,” Scott informed her. “It’s
closer and we can get an early start in the morning.”
“We’re never
going to find him,” Sequoia said between sobs.
“We’ll find him. We can call the sheriff when we get home and they’ll
start searching as well. Don’t worry, we’ll
find him.”
Blind panic had set in. Jonathan wasn’t thinking clearly; he wasn’t
thinking at all. Branches whipped him in the
face as he pushed his way through the ever darkening forest.
His mind wasn’t working properly but he knew one thing with absolute
certainty: he was going to die. He glanced back over his shoulder as he hurried
along. His legs hit something solid and he
fell forward, face first into a pile of branches, tearing his left cheek open in the
process. He wiped his face and got back to his
feet when his redemption appeared ahead of him. Through
the trees in front of him and slightly to the right, he saw a pair of bouncing headlights. He raced forward again for another ten feet before
tripping and falling again so he began to crawl. He
could just make out the road in front of him only thirty feet away. He crawled as rapidly as he could towards the road,
hope beginning to take root in his heart. The
sound behind him caught him off guard. Whatever
it was, it was racing towards him, trying to stop him from reaching the road.
Scott looked over at
Sequoia and wiped the tears from her cheek. It
killed him to see the woman he loved in such distress.
As much as he loved her, he only wanted her to be happy and would do
whatever it took to make that happen.
Suddenly Sequoia screamed
and pointed. “Watch out!”
Scott’s head snapped
forward to see a deer cross the road. It was
followed by another creature crawling slowly on all fours.
They were going to hit it.